If you must take care that your opinions do not differ in the least from those of the person with whom you are talking, you might just as well be alone.

I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.

Written laws are like spiderwebs: they will catch, it is true, the weak and poor but would be torn in pieces by the rich and powerful.

You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

Every communist must grasp the truth: “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

There is nothing more tyrannical than a strong popular feeling among a democratic people.

The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws.

The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.

I work for a government I despise for ends I think criminal.

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.

You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.